


The Lost Boy

by le_chat_vilain



Series: Gangs of Middle Earth [6]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Guns, Gunshots, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-16
Updated: 2015-11-16
Packaged: 2018-05-01 20:45:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5220206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/le_chat_vilain/pseuds/le_chat_vilain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Legolas seeks the comfort of his friend and part-time lover, Dot, after once again having his work and safety disregarded by his father.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Lost Boy

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve put an M rating on this just because there’s mention of hanky panky, but also because of Legolas’ self destructive course of action. Oh yes, and because there’s also a little bit of violence. This is a bit of a filler chapter just setting up some ground work for interactions between Legolas and Thranduil further down the track, so bear with me. This was a little difficult to write one because Legolas isn’t a character I generally connect with, but two because this is the part of him that I connect with on a very deeply personal level, so it was hard to confront those feelings and try and put them into pretty words. Also do listen to the song for this one, it’s beautiful.
> 
> Soundtrack: City Of Angels (Piano Version) by Thirty Seconds To Mars

Legolas trudged home to the loft in the rain, letting it wash over him like it could somehow cleanse him of all of his troubles. It had been a long night, and unlike so many others, he didn’t feel the strings of self loathing pulling at his soul; he’d got to spend unexpected time with Tauriel and all in all that was a win. Even if she did let those Durin guys get away. It was her funeral for once if his father was displeased and while he wished he could say that suited him, the truth was he’d take the fall for her in a beat of his lonely heart.

Then he saw them again.

He thought he’d been seeing things the last few weeks but he was sure of it this time. Lurking in the shadows, creeping up from their territory on the south side of the city. The Spiders. A gang of small time sneaks dealing in everything from information to dime bags, they rarely ventured off their turf except for when they sensed an opportunity. Legolas sensed one as well. He whipped his cellphone from his pocket and quickly took a series of snaps before the rain was able to do too much damage. With evidence in his pocket, he then drew the pistol from the back of his jeans and took aim at the one who appeared to be the leader of the pack. Without hesitation and with the precision of a surgeon, he fired two rounds into the man’s chest, and a single to his head, hitting him square between the eyes. There were four more crew members standing, and he had exactly four more rounds in the chamber.

Aim. Squeeze. Three.  
Aim. Squeeze. Two.  
Aim. Squeeze. One.  
Aim. Squeeze….squeeze…pain.

He hadn’t reloaded since the encounter with the Durins; there were only six shots. In the moment it took him to realise, the remaining thug had managed to wing him, the bullet grazing his left shoulder. Thankfully, he always carried backup, and with all the grace his ancestry bestowed upon him, he reached into his boot, flicked open the blade, and launched it in one fluid motion. It made its mark in the woman’s throat; even in the downpour his talent did not fail him. Wincing as he examined his wound, he stood and began making his way back towards Mirkwood in the hope that this time, this time he would win his father’s approval.

By the time he reached the club it was well after closing, and so he made a bee line for the staff entrance, beating at the door with his fist. The rain had soaked him to the skin and he was beginning to feel the chill working its way to his bones, to say nothing of the dull ache throbbing in his shoulder.

“Feren! Feren! For fuck’s sake it’s me, let me in you geezer!” he bellowed, and finally he heard the locks turning.

“I thought you’d knocked off for the night?” Feren asked, perplexed.

“Yeah well I had, then this happened,” Legolas explained showing the manager his wound. “Now tell me he’s still here?”

“Still here, in his office.”

Legolas ditched his coat on the steel table in the staff room and made his way upstairs to his father’s “office.” Thranduil was there, reading over some kind of paperwork, red wine in hand and a cigarette resting in the groove of the large marble ash tray in the centre of the booth’s table.

“Ada! Ada I have something to report, The Spiders-” Legolas was interrupted by his father’s exasperated sigh. Thranduil placed the wine down on the table gently before turning his face towards his son with a look of forced agreeableness. The way that he always looked at him; smoldering contempt with a vague air of irritation.

“What about them?” he asked, his tone full of apathy.

“I saw them again, on the corner of First and Laketown. I’m telling you something is going on, they know something!” he explained.

“Perhaps they think they do, did you take care of them?” The question was loaded with condescension, the way one would question a child if they’d washed their hands before dinner.

“What does it look like to you?” Legolas questioned, raising his voice as he skidded his empty pistol across the table and rolled up his sleeve to show Thranduil the bullet graze. “And yes, I called in a cleanup crew, don’t worry.”

“Good. Off you go then,” Thranduil dismissed him with a waive of his hand as he turned his attention back to his papers and wine.

“Dad, I got shot!” Legolas exclaimed, the rage born of rejection burning in his very bones. “Do you even give a shit?”

“Might I suggest the hospital then, son…” He didn’t even look up from his work.

“Typical, absolutely fucking typical,” Legolas muttered under his breath. “You know, I don’t know why I expected any different. Enjoy your wine you soulless sack of shit, nice to know you are at least capable of loving something.”

With that, he snatched the gun back, tucked it in his jeans, and stormed off. Donning his saturated coat, he ventured back out into the damp night, hell bent on finding someone to take this feeling away. He barely noticed the rain. All he could see was red and all he could feel was the licking tongues of his burning anger, and somewhere deep down inside the steely grip of hatred trying to gain purchase on his heart; for every shred of it he had for his father, he always had ten more for himself.

He needed to feel loved, and as he couldn’t feel it from his father or from himself, he would find it elsewhere. Before long he was beating down Dot’s door, the guilt of how he was intending to use her this way yet again resurfacing with record speed.

“Bloody hell, what happened to you?” she inquired as he stepped into her brownstone. Dot’s place had always been a comfort to him. He didn’t know if it was the way it was decorated as though some kind of modern incarnation of Snow White lived there, or if it was just because she was there, but there was a safety here that he felt nowhere else. She followed him into her ground floor apartment, concern dominating her face. The second she turned around after locking the door he took her face in his hand and kissed her.

“L…” she began, pushing him away. “Hey, come on, what happened, what’s wrong?”

“Shhh,” he commanded, and spun her against the wall, lifting her by the backside so that her legs instinctively wrapped around his waist and his hands could find her face again. Words were not what he thought he needed; he needed love, and he knew she loved him. He needed to lose himself in a moment, in her, in the curves of her body and the sound of her devotion as it rang from her lips. Just as she finally began to push her concern aside and join him in that moment, he felt the warmth of tears rolling down his cheeks and realized this wasn’t the way to deal with his problems. Defeated, he released her from his kiss, and lowered her back down until her feet rested safely on the floor again.

Legolas looked down into her wide brown eyes, full of love and caring. There had always been something about them that made him open up; he had never been able to lie to those eyes, not from the very first moment they’d locked onto his. His jaw clenched and he allowed his hand to fall from her cheek. What a pitiful form he must have cut.

“Oh, babe, what has he done now?” she asked in a whisper, drawing him into her skinny dark arms as he began to sob. “Hey, let’s get you out of these wet clothes and I’ll make some tea, yeah?”

Ten minutes later he lay on the sofa in her living room in a pair of old sweat pants he’d left there at some point, and his head in her lap as she sutured the wound on his arm. How simple life would be if he could love her like that, if his heart would just let him. Perhaps if the timing had been different he would have, and they’d have run off together to start a new life away from this toxic place. Of course that would never be, and dwelling on the hopelessness of the notion would do him no good, so he pushed the thoughts back into the void.

“Legolas, are you going to tell me what happened? How did you get this?” she asked.

“I got shot,” he replied curtly.

“Yeah, well I figured that part out. Who shot you was more what I was getting at.”

“Just some punk, don’t worry about it, it’s nothing,” he lied. Dot wasn’t like the other people he would run to looking for a shag. She wasn’t a whore, or a junkie, or a stripper. She wasn’t a part of that world at all and he wouldn’t drag her into it, she was too important to him. Of course, she knew who he was, what he was, what he did, but never would he give anyone cause to hurt her or come for her, so never would she know any more about it than that. The last thing she needed to know was that war was on the horizon. She was a veterinarian who’d had the rotten luck of meeting him one night at Mirkwood, and then of falling in love with the man who’s heart was no longer his own to give. There was no need for her to be involved. She pursed her lips and looked down at him, her displeasure at being shut out yet again evident in the furrowing of her brow and the roughness with which she tied off his stitches.

“And what did your father have to say about said punks?” He could tell by her inflection that she was sending him a warning: don’t come to me unless you’re going to tell me what’s going on.

“What do you think? I could turn up dead tomorrow and that bastard wouldn’t bat an eyelid,” he spat, sitting up and landing both feet on the floor to rest his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. “He doesn’t give a fuck about me, Dot. Never has, never will.”

“Hey,” she whispered, sliding her arm around his shoulders and once again pulling him into her embrace. “You don’t need him. You’ve come this far without him, haven’t you?”

“I know. I know that and yet…he’s my dad…he’s supposed to…”

Try as he might, Legolas couldn’t choke out the rest of the words. The thought that his father was supposed to be the one there cheering him on, protecting him, mentoring him and loving him. He was supposed to be a source of unconditional love and support and yet all Legolas ever remembered of Thranduil was his callous indifference and impossibly high expectations. Doing his best to hold the tears back again, he looked at her with eyes full of pleading, and she reached up to pull him closer and rest their foreheads together letting him know that she understood.

“I was never going to be good enough, was I?”

“Babe, there is no such thing as good enough for people like him,” she reassured. “Fuck him. You only get one life, don’t waste it living for someone else.”

This time when he slipped his hand into the tight curls of her black hair and kissed her there was no protest, and before long their bodies were melting together on the Persian rug in front of her fireplace. She was right, she was so incredibly right, and from now on he would tow the line, but only in so far as doing so served his own interests. No longer would he be his father’s whipping boy, and no longer would he live to please a man who couldn’t be pleased.

This was the only life he would have - it was time to stop running, and be present in it. Moreover, there was only one world, and if he was to be part of the generation that would inherit it, then he would make sure there was something left worth inheriting; with or without the support of the King of Sin.


End file.
